All the general officers and other high-ranking officers of the Imperial Army were gathered in one place. In the front of the room, Lucia Aden sat at a table next to Sasha's father, King Sullivan of Cloudsea, the Marshal of the First Army. Nearby, King Vash of Vjiskald, Marshal of the Second Army, sat with his children, all warlords, and also Fredrick Mason, the chairman of the Bank in Grael Nydia. The stage was empty. Servants scurried about offering glasses of water and wine to the officers at the various tables.
Sasha was going to make the proclamation that the whole Empire, if not the whole world, was waiting for. Lucia felt relived to finally just be over with the waiting.
Empress Sasha of Great House Varelion ascended a small stairway up onto the stage. She was wearing resplendent armor crafted from countless iridescent blue-green scales perfectly fitted together. She was not wearing the matching helmet though, and her salmon-brown hair had since been dyed darker brown. The room fell dead silent, waiting for her to speak.
"I will now reveal to you one of the cherished family secrets that has been passed down in my family since long before the time of the Charlatan King. I will speak to those gathered here about the secret history of House Renna."
Lucia was astonished. True knowledge of the world before the war was extremely rare and extremely valuable. The oculomancers made sure that humanity forgot much from before that time. House Aden had access to very little knowledge from before the war. This, this was priceless.
"Renna the Witch, also known as Renna the Scientist, was a remarkably curious woman. One day, she became deeply curious about the true nature of religions. So, she fed all of the world's holy books into an electronic machine capable of learning from text. Then, she asked the machine to generate one hundred unique Holy Books, complete with mythologies about how the world was created, answers to questions about the immortal soul and life after death, and other trappings of the religions of that time."
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They had machines that could read and learn from text?!
"Renna built one hundred walled cities, large and self-sufficient, with glass gardens to grow food in locations with access to a healthy water table. These became the Hundred Walled Cities of Renna. Each city was assigned a single Holy Book. Each city was designed to be impossible to leave. The cities were populated with enslaved people, who continued to reproduce for many generations, while being forced to convert to the religion in their Holy Book. After hundreds of years, these cities were overflowing with religious zealots, ready for the next phase of the experiment.
"Renna demolished the walls with explosives, causing them to collapse outward. The trapped people inside those cities were then free to leave. Thousands and thousands of fanatical believers flooded out of each city, and quickly discovered their equally-fanatical neighbors. Thus, the great Tournament of Religions began. Renna made a prediction about which religion would win this tournament. She predicted that one god, a fearsome omen of war, would be the final victor. But she was wrong.
"It took two hundred years for the war to end. The number of people who died during the war measured in the hundreds of millions. To Renna's surprise, the Church of the Lawgiver won the Tournament of Religions. Renna discovered why. The Lawgiver demanded a certain amount of time spent gambling with real money, at all ages. From early childhood, children strengthen the risk-taking muscle. This experience gives them a skill that they can use for their entire life, an intuitive understanding of when to gamble, and when to play it safe. The Church of the Lawgiver developed new technologies rapidly, while also having the standard trappings of religion, such as a class of warriors as well as the subjugation of women.
"Renna converted to the religion, and her son became the Primarch. Ever since, the Church of the Lawgiver has been entirely controlled by the Renna Clan. The large population of devoted followers was the primary differentiating factor between Renna and her peers. It is why she was so successful during the war with the Charlatan King.
"The Lawgiver had no Prophet, and the Book of the Lawgiver was written by a machine. The Lawgiver is a false god! As Empress of Nydia, I declare a Holy War between the Empire of Nydia and the Theocracy of the Lawgiver! We will bring Father Winter's justice to the Heritors of House Renna!"
The room erupted in clapping and cheers.